Posts by Galidron

Steve Jobs in iPhone bitchslap to creationists, Tea Party

Kansas Schoolboard

At least Kansas voted out all the school board members who were pushing intelligent design in the class. Although it still does amaze me that school board members don't have to have any credentials to be such.

Surprise Automotive X Prize winners announced

US Sales

I doubt a car like this would sell very well in the US. There are many people here who are terrible drivers, so they figure they need a bigger car so they wont get hurt when they cause an accident.

Parents back legal ban of violent vidgames sales to kids

Problems with the law

1. This law only covers video games. Why aren't movies, books, or other media included if this is so difficult to control? Books don't even have a rating system and can be very graphic, but no one seems worried about that.

2. All consoles now have parental control systems that can be used to prevent you're kid from playing these kind of games. This would work if they have purchased the game on their own or borrowed it from a friend, but obviously not if they went to a friends house to play it. If you are worried about computer games, you shouldn't let your kids have an admin account on the computer, but most parents probably don't know how to do that.

Also

Most of the people who would be busted for doing this would likely be teens, at least in the area I live most people working retail in Wal-Mart are people who couldn't buy the games.

They don't

At least in the US there are no laws restricting movie sales by age, it is done through self-regulation by theaters and stores.

Assange asks for new lawyer

Maybe not coincidence

It could be simply because he has been in the press more. Becoming relatively famous can make you more of a target by itself. Also, it is possible that the women involved in the case only met him because of his increased level of fame, fan girls or some such.

General Motors bitchslaps Tesla with Range Anxiety™

Almost

They would need to maintain a standard Voltage and Amp output as well. That can be more difficult then just dimensions and connections, although doable.

US gov slaps flack for fake iTunes game reviews

Bad idea but

It doesn't bother me too much. Depending on the total number of reviews the ones posted by the employees could easily have been insufficient to alter the scoring much.

The example comments are exactly what I ignore when I'm looking at reviews. They tell me nothing about the product.

Short passwords 'hopelessly inadequate', say boffins

password generation

My password generation technique is easier in my opinion. You take a phrase that sticks in your head, say 'I hate passwords'. Then you mash it up a bit and get something like, 'I h@e passw0rds'. A 15 character password with 3 symbols and a number and mixed case, all easy to remember and difficult to crack. At least with the password crackers I've used in the past.

First SMS Trojan for Android is in the wild

Trojans can be spread by viruses

There have been many Trojans that do not require user interaction to install. This one does, but that doesn't have to be the case.

Apple preps iOS fix as Germany warns of iPhone peril

What happened?

According to many posts I've read on different forums the iPhone can't ever be hacked because of signed code limitations. This must not have happened, its just a hoax.

UK.gov sticks to IE 6 cos it's more 'cost effective', innit

Proxy Firewalls?

I've never encountered a Firewall with that capability. Must be a proxy based Firewall which means it probably breaks a fair number of web apps. Proxy based Firewalls wont allow protocols to do anything they are unfamiliar with so no HTML5 or such without an upgrade.

Considering how poorly malware scanners are doing these days, I suspect they are opening themselves up to a targeted attack. Spearphishing emails at the ready.

iPad alert: Are you a selfish elite or an independent geek?

Source

Along this line, the data originated from a FaceBook poll. Although I'm sure that doesn't change anything.

Airline ejects passenger for being hungry

Maybe not

Most flights in the US don't server meals. They have to be a minimum flight time and over a common meal time.

Global warming brings peace and happiness

What kind of water shortages?

"creating annal water shortages in mainland Spain"

Is that bad? Does Spain need anal water?

FLYING CAR, full hover, fairly quiet, offered to US Marines

Alaska

If your references are accurate and Pilot is the third most dangerous profession, then it is most likely because of Alaskan brush pilots. They fly under much more dangerous conditions then most, maybe even more dangerous the Navy carrier pilots.

Apple bars radiation nanny from App Store

Location Location Location

What happens when the mast is on the other side of your head? Are you ok with the call dropping when you turn around in place?

Ed Livengood

Computer grads can't even get jobs offering personal services

@First job is always crap

Agreed. My first job out of Uni bounced one of my paychecks.

Dutch send submarine to fight Somali pirates

Anti-Piracy Measures

Finally, anti-piracy measures I can fully support.

Jobs tells iPhone users to get a grip

Slightly off topic

One troll to rule them all.

Who takes the time to reply to almost all of the comments on a single topic?

US census inflates latest employment numbers

TARP

Last I heard 75% of the money used to bail out banks was paid back, but that was a while ago.

'Dossiers on enemies' found in Italian Scientology raid

Everyone wants to change the way you behave

Every organization and individual you interact with wants to change the way you behave. Politicians do it to get votes. Corporations do it to get you to buy their products. Friends, wives, husbands all do it for all kinds of reasons.

It is nearly impossible to interact with someone else without trying to alter their behavior in some way. The difference is mostly in the extent to which they want to alter it, but it is almost always for personal gain and not always intended. Peer pressure is a very powerful force.

Also any group will tend to view non-members in a more negative perspective then members. Most groups exist not just to tie members together, but to keep those who don't adhere to their beliefs out. It isn't something that is limited to religions and cults.

World+bitch flocking to expose self on Facebook

TLDR

Is that used here?

Foreign IT pros in USA get paid more than Americans - study

Anecdotal Evidence

I've seen this twice now. Anecdotal evidence is no evidence at all. It is very nearly always flawed by basic human traits which I will leave you to research on your own.

Robot cars can now do a Rockford into a parking space

Could be handy

From what I've seen in parking lots, most people can't park between two lines when they aren't under any pressure to do so quickly.

Woman loses Bebo privacy case against lad mag

Walking down a path

Do you not have toll road's on the other side of the pond? I didn't think that was something the US invented.

EA imposes used games tax

They do in the US

I'm guessing you aren't living in the US. Here in the US the price drops for most console games pretty quickly. The very popular titles stay at full price longer, but I've only purchased one or two games at full price for the PS3. For most of them I have not spent over $30.

Terror in the Outback: Attack of the Giant Space Balloon

Just in Case

In the instance that this isn't a joke about something I'm not familiar with, Roswell is a real place in New Mexico. If it is a joke about something I'm not familiar with then carry on.

Cops raid Gizmodo editor in pursuit of iPhone 4G 'felony'

@AC 15:52

I keep seeing this argument over and over and I have yet to figure out how anyone can believe it.

If I left my phone in a bar why the hell would you call Sanyo and tell them you found it? Even after logging into my Fb page from the phone and finding out what my name is you still think the appropriate way to return it is calling Sanyo? Certainly turning it over to the bar in the case I might come back for it would never cross your mind.

@AC 15:52

They've done studies on this, and surprisingly most people do the right thing to try to return the wallet or phone. If you need I can look up citations for this, but it one place the studies were referenced was Paper, Rock, Scissors: Game Theory in Every Day Life.

Google mocks Steve Jobs with Chrome-Flash merger

Wrong

Incorrect statements.

"Without TCP/IP, Flash is basically useless anyway, unless you only use Email, and in that case you don't really need the Internet because Email goes over a separate protocol to web traffic."

Email uses TCP/IP so you can't use email without it.

The Internet uses far more then the HTTP protocol. The Email Protocol, SMTP, uses the internet.

Most Email clients these days are able to use HTTP email which means you can have flash embedded in email.

"I only ever use the Email protocol to browse the web, meaning I don't use the Flash engine."

When you use HTTP email you are using the web protocol to view the "Internet" if the email message is not using HTTP it isn't "browsing" the web in any way.

Generally browsing the web refers to visiting web pages which is at best difficult to do inside of an email client.

Steve Jobs and governator tout transplant reform

Transplants

Here in the US at least, when you called for a transplant you have to be able to make it to the hospital within 4 hours. This is at least in part because organs have a limited lifespan outside a functioning body, for most organs this is measured in hours.

NZ internet filter goes live - gov forgets to tell public

90% ??

It is unlikely to stop any children over the age of 10 getting to such material. It will only stop people who barely know how to use the internet.

Canadian cops taser 'naked and agitated' man

Leg Shots

A leg shot has a good chance of being fatal. If you hit the major artery in it the target will bleed out in short order.

Experts fret over iPad security risks

Next up,

Police experts say living in a large city increases the odds someone will ask you for bus fair.

'Anti-cyberbullying' rapper sorry for SMS smack talk

Time travel

"The texts were read out on air while the band were been interviewed in the studio on Tuesday, much to their apparent displeasure."

I suspect time travel may have been involved in the creation of this story.

Santa Fe man demands half a mill for being near iPhone

Disconect his electricity

If we wants to be free of EMF he shouldn't have any electricity to his house in the first place.

Evaluating enterprise application software

Security Issues

I've found that many software vendors assume that because their software package is intended for internal use they don't need to implement any significant security measures. I think the earlier you know weather an application will meet your companies security requirements the better.